these days. But you just wait till you get upstairs. You've got the
surprise of your life coming to you."

"Outside's good enough for me," Mr. Ranny declared. "I want to take a
look at that old apple orchard."

"I'll go upstairs with you!" said Eleanor. "Come on, Aunt Flo; let's see
what it's like."

At the top of the steps they both gave an exclamation of delight. The
house, hemmed in, in front, by its trees and underbrush, overlooked from
its rear windows a valley of surpassing loveliness. For miles the eye
could wander over orchards full of pink-and-white peach blossoms on
leafless boughs, over farm-lands and woody spaces full of floating clouds
of white dogwood. Through the paneless windows came the warm spring air,
full of the odor of tender growing things and the wholesome smell of the
freshly upturned earth.

"Randolph Bartlett, come up here this instant!" called Mrs. Ranny. "It's
the loveliest thing you ever saw!"

But Mr. Ranny was eagerly examining the remains of a somewhat extensive
chicken farm.

"Go down and show him around," Eleanor advised Quin, with a glimmer of
hope. "Aunt Flo and I will explore the rest of the house."

They not only explored, but in their imagination they remodeled it.
Eleanor, in spite of her daydreams, was a very practical little person,
and, with her power of visualizing a scene for others as well as for
herself, she soon made Mrs. Ranny see the place painted and clean, with
rag rugs on the floors, quaint old mahogany furniture, tall brass
candlesticks on the mantel, and gay chintz curtains at the windows.

Mrs. Ranny grew quite animated talking about it, and forgot the
disturbing fact that she had not had a cigarette since dinner.

"Do you know," she said to Eleanor, as they came back to the window and
looked down at the two men talking and gesticulating eagerly in the
garden below, "I believe if Ranny had something like this to work with
and play with, things would be different."

"Of course they would," Eleanor agreed eagerly--"for him and for you too.
Why don't you try it, Aunt Flo?"

"Oh, it would cost too much to put it in repair. But then, six thousand
dollars is very little, isn't it? Ran spent that much for his big car."

"Yes; and he could _sell_ his big car. You'd lots rather have this than
an extra motor. And we could get him interested in fixing the place up,
and he could keep dogs and cows and things----"

"But what about his mother?"

"You wouldn't ha